Science – Page 10 – Butterbees and Bumbleflies

The Gift of Giving

It’s something all parents (I’d hope, anyway) want their kids to be able to do – to give. To give of themselves, to give things they love, to give to people they love, and to give to people they’ve never even met. But how do you start teaching and nurturing that gift in your child? And when? I think the answer to when, and maybe even how, varies by child. But here’s what I did with Becca this year that seems to have started planting the seed.

She’s super into money – sorting coins is really fun for her. She doesn’t really understand or remember the values of the coins, but she understands the concept of what it’s for, and that it all adds up to equal stuff purchased at the store. Before she was born, we were given a large piggy bank for her, and over time, the coins (and a few stray $1 bills) have added up. We dump loose change into her piggy bank (and now her brother’s as well) randomly. So, I got out her coin sorting tray one day, and we dumped her piggy bank contents out on the floor. She was super excited to help me sort, and decided she would find all the pennies, and leave the silver ones for Mommy. That’s fine. We had fun with the activity, and it was great fine motor practice for her too – picking up and sorting through all those coins.

Then, we sat down and made a list of all the people she would like to buy a gift for for Christmas. She thought of most of the people on her own, though she did have prompting for a couple of them.

The next day, we went to Dollar Tree on a mission. She had her list in hand, and we talked very seriously before we got out of the car about what the expectations were for this trip. We weren’t there to buy things for her. We were there to buy specifically for the people on her list. She had a bag of quarters (and a few $1 bills) to cover her gifts and the tax. We also took three extra dollars just in case she thought of someone last minute, and also so that she would have to count out the money to the cashier.

She did a fabulous job. She got a bit “grabby” a couple of times, and I had to remind her to allow ME to take the items off the shelf for her. But I was super impressed with her thoughtfulness. She’s a very deep thinker anyway, so it was the perfect place for her to stop and think about what each person on her list would enjoy. A game for a friend, a craft for another, a candle for one family member, an airplane puzzle for another. A sudoku book, a little stuffed animal, she had a thoughtful reason for each and every gift she selected. And then we got to the checkout, and she was so proud to tell the cashier she was spending HER money to buy gifts. We had the bag of quarters pre-counted, so I handed the cashier the bag and said “This is $7. She’ll count the rest of it for you.” We had practiced at home, so she knew to start with $8 in her counting. She counted out the $1’s and I handed each $1 to the cashier as she counted it. She was excited that she got to keep some, too. (I hadn’t told her I brought extra.)

Here she is opening her bag to get her $1 bills out to count them.

She was SO proud of her receipt showing she had bought presents with her very own money.

When it came time to wrap, I had her help me wrap the presents that were going to my family in Tulsa for Thanksgiving. I’ll be perfectly honest and say that having her help wrap was very stressful for both of us. She did enjoy having me help her write on the little labels, and sticking them on the packages. She was so happy on Thanksgiving (“Thanksmas”) morning to get to give her gifts to Granny, PawPaw, and Daddy!

Since we learned from the first wrapping experience, I decided to do something totally different for the rest of her gifts. The two for friends, we put in gift bags. The gifts for family, I wrapped (while she watched) in brown paper, and then she used wet chalks to decorate the boxes. I helped her write who they were to and her name, and then we put them under our tree. She is so excited about having her gifts for family under the tree!! And I know she’ll be really excited about giving them as well.

There is nothing like seeing the excitement on your child’s face as she eagerly anticipates Christmas morning… but there’s really nothing in the world like knowing that a lot of that excitement is about GIVING her gifts that she bought. Because THAT is what Christmas is all about – remembering God’s Gift to us, and giving our gifts to others.

Animal Habitat Sensory Play

The day after Thanksgiving, we got to spend a tiny little bit of time with my best friend and her family at their home, and I got an idea from her that has become one of Becca’s all-time-best-loved “actiperies” (she can totally say activities now, but she still calls them actiperies b/c she knows I think it’s cute. ha!). She has always had a big fascination with animals and their homes, but this takes it to a whole new level… so thank you, Rena, for the inspiration!!

Arctic Habitat

What you need:
Storage Container
Flour
Sugar
Powdered Sugar
Corn Starch
Safari Ltd Arctic TOOB (aff link – thank you!)

It’s super simple – use a little bit of each of the first four ingredients and stir it up in a container. Then add your Arctic TOOB animals, eskimos, and igloo, and you are ready to play!

An old toothbrush made a fun addition, and great fine motor practice – as she decided to brush the snow off of the animals and people.

Antarctic Habitat

What you need:
Storage Container
Rock Salt (I used Ice Cream Maker Salt… b/c it was on hand)
Kosher Salt
Table Salt
Safari Ltd Penguins TOOB

Same as above – add some salt and stir up in a container, add your penguins, and you’re ready to play!

We also added some play “snow” from our ornaments project because she really wanted to make it snow on the penguins. 🙂

If you’d like, you can print out the maps and titles I made to tape to your lids.
FREE PRINTABLE HERE!

Enjoy! And be prepared – the Arctic box’s “snow” might make dark clothes turn white. 😉

Wacky Astronaut Wednesday

So, if you’ve been following my blog for any length of time, you know that Becca is what is termed by professional educators as “gifted.” Most of us “normal” folks think pretty much inside a box – even if we are high achievers. Well, Becca doesn’t have a box, or even really know what it would be like to be inside one.. unless of course, it’s that big box in the family room that she likes to pretend is a car, or an airplane, or… a rocket. Becca’s main interest at almost 2 1/2 (in just 5 short days! WOW!) is outer space. She’s quick to tell you she’s going to go to the moon some day. And Mars. And Saturn, too. And who knows, maybe some day she will. She enjoys watching “This Week at NASA” with me, and often has questions that I have to google the answers for because I’m a little clueless when it comes to deep space and techy-science stuff. We are learning a lot together about our space program! She’s certain one day she’ll live on the ISS (International Space Station). And if this interest continues for her, maybe she will. (The sky isn’t her limit… deep space is her limit! Heaven help us the day she first sees Star Trek…)

So, we’ve of course been tracking the creation of Orion, and we anxiously watched and waited on the 4th for it’s launch. I woke up early and began tracking everything, taking screen shots on my phone of the launch pad as I waited for liftoff so I could show her… ready to go get her up if it was really gonna happen. Well, so, I waited, and waited, and if you, too, were tracking Orion, you know that liftoff did not occur on the 4th. I got her up near the end of the time window, and she came down and ate her breakfast in front of the tv, anxiously hoping that maybe they would be successful. Here are some of her responses as she watched the rocket sitting there, not moving:

In response to being woken up and told the rocket was hopefully going to launch soon: “I’m gonna go on that rocket all the way to Mars! Are you gonna go too?”

Watching:
“Mommy, it’s not moving.”

“When’s it bwasting off, Mommy?”

“10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4… Can it bwast off now?”

“10.. Bwast off.”

“Is it moving, Mommy?

“That’s a big rocket! It’s gonna bwast off. The grass is shaking!”

“It’s got smoke, Mommy.”

Hearing that the launch has been cancelled:
“Mars… but they’re not going!”

Yup, the girl was super bummed out, and unimpressed – as you can see in the pic. So, as you probably know, the very first Orion test launch time on the 5th was successful, and I had it cued up on the dvr to show her when she got up. So, we once again had breakfast on the tv trays in the living room while having our watch party for Orion.

In response to being woken up and told the rocket had, in fact, successfully launched and we were going to get to go watch it: “Oh wow! Mommy they aren’t going to Mars today. They’re gonna go around and around the Earth. But I’m gonna go on ‘Rion to Mars. I am. Let’s go see!”

So she sat there through the countdown, anxiously awaiting, and I got this video of her watching. (Turn your volume up so you can hear the tv narrator.) Her comment is epic… and the expression on her face is priceless.

View the YouTube Video Here

“It’s going!”

“They counted!”

She sat and watched with rapt attention through the first 5 or so minutes of the flight, as each stage successfully broke away. We had to leave to go to an appointment, and haven’t had a chance yet to watch the splash down, but it’s saved on the dvr and we’ll watch it soon.

The next morning, after having had some friends babysit for us that night, she showed me a rocket she had built in her room out of Duplo flowers – all stacked high, and sitting on top of a “launch pad” of Duplo bricks. She told me she made ‘Rion but it breaks apart. Proceeded to run over, grab her rocket, and fly it through the air, breaking off flowers and dropping them “into orbit” before leaving just a final set of two flowers. “THIS is ‘Rion, Mommy! It flies around WAY out in space and splashes in the water and becomes an airplane!” (yup, still has that 2 1/2 year old imagination! HA!)

I love her fascination with space, and I want to encourage her in every way I possibly can. The struggle always is to remember that it’s totally ok if she doesn’t become an astronaut for real. Because her interests will change, and her skills may excel elsewhere. And that’s ok. But for now, she’s my little astronaut-in-dreams and it’s super fun to call her my own little space cadet. Her daddy and I are so proud of her and so amazed every day by the things she comes up with. Her brain is beyond our understanding, and we pray we are always exactly the parents she needs us to be.

Some Orion photos for you:

Christmas Tree Busy Bag

This is probably one of the most basic projects, with the most open-ended results, and tons of fun!

What you’ll need:
Felt in lots of colors, mainly scraps – but one large green piece.
A Ziploc bag for storage

Simply cut out a tree shape, and then cut your scraps in random other shapes to make the ornaments for the tree… sit back, and let your child decorate! It’s really that simple! I made this bag last year as a craft at our MOPS group, and was so excited to pull it out of the Christmas box for Becca this year – she is LOVING it!

Christmas Treasure Box

Back in August in my post, Buried Treasure, I had made a little storage container of beans, and hidden pom poms. She enjoyed that activity for a while, and then I recycled the beans over to her sensory table for our big Thanksgiving activity… but the idea is BACK… for Christmas!

I was grocery shopping and on the dry goods aisle, I saw a bag of split peas, and there the idea was born. I grabbed that $0.88 bag, a $0.64 bag of rice, and I was done! I already had at home the other items needed for this box.

Here’s what I used:
1 bag split peas
1 bag rice
Mint extract (b/c it’s what I had, you could use essential oil)
Vinegar
Red food coloring (it pretty much took the whole tiny squeeze bottle for it to not look pink, so be prepared)
A large Ziploc bag
Wax paper
A large Ziploc storage box
Treasure, a scoop, and a bowl

So to make the rice red, you’ll dump your bag of rice into your big Ziploc bag (I used a gallon storage bag), add 2 Tbsp vinegar, and then lots of red. I think I ended up counting like 45 drops before I got it really red. The gel food coloring supposedly works better – I haven’t tried it b/c I just always use what I have. Thinking I’ll buy some next time. Then, if you’d like, add a few drops of your Mint scent – you could use Essential Oils if you have them, or if you happen to have Mint extract on hand from cooking, that will work too – that’s what I used. Shake it all up really good, and spread it out on wax paper to dry. Once it’s really, really dry (give it several hours), you can combine the peas and the red rice in the storage box. Then I had some little shatter proof ornaments ($1) and some cookie cutters I put in the box to be her “treasure.” She has LOVED hiding the items under the peas and rice and then digging them out. We even tried a candy cane ornament from the tree, as well as a bracelet. The possibilities for treasure are endless!

The best part about this activity was it’s cost and how quickly it all came together once the rice was dry – on a day we had a ton of other stuff going on, no less! And she loves it! SCORE!